Worldwide Beekeeping
Beekeeping => Pests and Diseases => Topic started by: Jen on October 20, 2015, 12:34:09 pm
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Would like to talk Nosema treatment. We here in California are looking at another El Nino year, lost of rain and moisture. Thinking the nosema treatment would be good this year.
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I drench treat my bees every spring/early summer before it's time for supers. Bees look like wet rats when they're being drenched but they clean themselves up pretty quick. This time of year, I treat their syrup because I'm concerned that I may chill them too much pouring syrup/med on them. Probably would work ok to fall drench where you're located; drenching is a more effective treatment since the bees have to ingest the med when they clean themselves up after treating.
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Chip, when you say drench treat, do you mean with a spray bottle?
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Nope, I literally pour in on the bees. I use a plastic watering can (for house or potted plants) I bought at Walmart. It has a sprinkler head so the syrup/med mixture comes gushing out from the many holes in the head of the waterer instead of a single stream. I give them a good cup or so and the bees look like drowned rats when I'm done.
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I've seen that done Chip. I know there are those that do, but I just can't drench them like that, anymore than I would drench my kid or pets. I put the meds in sugar syrup and feed it to them in a pint jar.
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Jen, did you have your kids vaccinated? I would rather be drenched than have needles poked in me. If it works, it's worth doing, even if it makes you uncomfortable.
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My understanding of the benefits of drenching is that it forces the bees to ingest the med as they clean themselves up. When added to the syrup, it isn't as effective because the bees tend to store it in the comb where it looses it's efficacy. I didn't drench my kids or dogs either!
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Now.. Iddee.. I covered that option by saying that I know that others do that. Personally, I am 'uncomfortable' with it
Chip, this is how I learned last year. When feeding nosema medicated syrup from pint jars, you WANT the bees to store it in the cells. Preferably in the back of the cells. Then they cover the medicated syrup with nectar or sugar syrup and cap it. So then, the bees will eat the the syrup on the top thru the winter. Then when late winter comes along and nosema is looming, the bees then eat the medicated syrup when they most need it, hence protecting themselves from nosema, and dying in the later part of winter.
It's the process I did last year, and it was so easy.
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That is the way my mentor taught me to do it as well Jen. Make sure they stored it. I can also see the benefit of the drench, knocking the nosema back early.. Kind of like treating for mites.. making sure they have few going into winter so they have a better chance at survival.
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That's the way I learned/started too Jen but my nosema counts were way too high. Drenching is the only method I've used that significantly reduced the spore counts. Since I switched, my hives do look better even in summer! Fumagillan is fairly unstable--sensitive to heat, light, etc. That said, I do feed it in syrup when it's too cool to drench. I just wish keeping bees was as simple as it was when I was a child!
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Chip; I just wish keeping bees was as simple as it was when I was a child!
Isn't that the truth.
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Thanks guys! :)
Scott - "That is the way my mentor taught me to do it as well Jen. Make sure they stored it.
How would I make sure they store it? It looks just like sugar syrup in the hive...
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Almost all feeding that is done at this time of year will be stored, as the bees have slowed down on brood. as long as they are not totally plugged and have a space to store it.
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Thanks Apis :)
Bees are bringing in pollen for sure. So I know the frames are plugged. I can insert a clean frame or two, of pulled comb for them if I need too.
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My main concern is Nosema ceranae, not N. apis, especially since my bees will be in California in a couple of weeks and will have more flight time than here. There has been some research from Europe that suggests that bees infected with N. ceranae do not take syrup as well as bees infected with N. apis. Hence, my preference for the drench. You may want to take a look at the following document from UC Davis:
http://entomology.ucdavis.edu/files/147621.pdf
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Thanks Chip ;) I will read that.
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Chip; I just wish keeping bees was as simple as it was when I was a child!
Isn't that the truth.
i just wish everything was as simple as when I was a child :laugh:
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No kidding! I look fondly upon the days I was a kid and came home full of dirt and pitch from playing in the forest all day. Mom had dinner ready. Poured me a bath. Tucked me into bed. I slept so sound ....
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Jen:
I think Chip is referring to how easy it was to keep bees prior to nosema and vorroa mites. One of my old pals here kept bees for fifty years, and he said that in the old days (probably prior to 1990) he did not treat bees because they did not need treating. He said there were so many bees that he caught dozens of swarms each summer and sold them or gave them away. There were so many swarms that he could drive down the country roads and see swarms in trees on the fence rows. He said it was not uncommon to catch three swarms on a Sunday afternoon. He is so totally honest, that I believe him.
The downside then was that honey was CHEAP.
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Jen:
I think Chip is referring to how easy it was to keep bees prior to nosema and vorroa mites. One of my old pals here kept bees for fifty years, and he said that in the old days (probably prior to 1990) he did not treat bees because they did not need treating. He said there were so many bees that he caught dozens of swarms each summer and sold them or gave them away. There were so many swarms that he could drive down the country roads and see swarms in trees on the fence rows. He said it was not uncommon to catch three swarms on a Sunday afternoon. He is so totally honest, that I believe him.
The downside then was that honey was CHEAP.
Yep. When I was in grad school in Oregon, a professor in my department kept bees and he didn't do anything but add supers and harvest honey. He told me he even let his hives (2) replace their own queens! Most everything else was simpler in the good old days too.
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DDT and other sprays not withstanding? I can remember seeing the sprayer planes and thinking....
"Aww crap, were going to be splitting hives to replace the dead outs.....
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DDT and other sprays not withstanding? I can remember seeing the sprayer planes and thinking....
"Aww crap, were going to be splitting hives to replace the dead outs.....
it was after the DDT days plus he bordered against a natural area the university set aside for nature studies; he was is a pretty prime spot. I used to send bees to east Texas (near Kunze) and lost about half the nucs I made one spring to spray and I was fairly close to the Big Thicket :'(
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I'm getting ready to do my fumagilin treatment this week. I need a little help with the math.
Been refreshing last years process with this great read http://scientificbeekeeping.com/the-nosema-twins-part-4-treatment/
I recently bought 3, 1 gallon feeders. I will inspect my 3 hives before treatment. But I'm pretty darned sure I'll be down to one chamber colonies.
1st question: When this link refers to "1 chamber feeding", would that be 1 deep box?
2nd question: Can I put the medicated syrup into my 1 gallon feeder buckets, put them on the hives... and when the bees have emptied the bucket... call it good?
(https://worldwidebeekeeping.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fs2.postimg.cc%2Fie1rf3r51%2Fnosema4_2.jpg&hash=787c08a3836837da447b0dd172a513c59ba69be9) (http://postimg.cc/image/ie1rf3r51/)
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I wonder if this is another one of those situations that the answer would vary in different parts of the country. I don't know of anyone in this area that does a drench for Nosema. Everyone uses a medicated sugar syrup to treat in the fall. When the treatment is done this way, we don't have a problem with Nosema.
Jen, a few weeks ago I printed out the mixing and feeding instructions of Fumagilin-B from Medivet. Medivet recommends the following ratios for FALL treatments:
Water +Sugar =Syrup +Fumagilin B
1/2 Gal +8lbs. =1 gal + .18ounces or 1 rounded teaspoon
2 1/4 Gal +37lbs. = 5.2gal + .85 ounces or 24g bottle
For our purpose, I won't bother with the larger proportions. If needed readers can visit Medivet's web site. www.medivet.ca/ (http://www.medivet.ca/)
For 2 chamber colonies= 2 gallons of treated 2:1 sugar syrup (approximately 30,000 bees)
For 1 chamber colonies= 1 gallon of treated 2:1 sugar syrup (approximately 18,000 bees)
(Medivet is referring to double deeps or single deep hive bodies. )
Additional recommendations include:
Using a concentration of 2:1 sugar syrup for treatment.
For best results heat the water to 35-50C, remove from heat source, dissolve the Fumagilin B in water and then add the sugar.
To eradicate Nosema parasites, Fumagilin B should be applied over several weeks.
Heavily infested colonies that will no longer take in syrup may be sprayed repeatedly, directly onto the bees, frame by frame, with 1:1 sugar syrup containing 2g of Fumagilin per 1 liter.
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the powdered drugs are hard to mix into the syrup at times I like to put it into a jar with water and shake it till the drugs have all dissolved then add it to the syrup. Like how one makes gravy.
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I have never treated for nosema. It makes me wonder how common it is in my area. We are in a hot, dry climate. As I have stated many times, I hate feeding. Who treats the feral colonies that seem to exist?
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"the powdered drugs are hard to mix into the syrup at times I like to put it into a jar with water and shake it till the drugs have all dissolved then add it to the syrup."
what apis said jen!
bakers, great post!
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Good Morning Lazy :) curious how many hives do you have? I have 3...
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Good Morning Lazy :) curious how many hives do you have? I have 3...
@jen:
I have a total of six hives, but I am going to combine two of them. I will soon have four hives in De Leon, near town, and one hive at the ranch. My 200 plus pounds of honey came from two hives this year. I have two hives that have two deeps and three mediums on them. Of note, my hives are de Leon hives are eight frame hives.
The one hive at the ranch is five years old and has never been treated with anything. They have lived through a horrendous drought, and have never made any excess honey.
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Lazy ~ I was wondering because I usually go into winter with 2 hives. Last year I paced and pondered whether to do the Fumagilin treatment. After seeing many pics of nosema, and researching the loss of hives to nosema, and reading www.scientificbeekeeping on this subject, I realized that Fumagilin sure can't hurt the bees, and the fumagilin is only going to be in the winter stores...so why not give them a booster shot for the winter
With only two hives and one nuc, and a supposed very wet, moldy, winter... I think it's a good idea to give them a little help.
The reason I asked how many hives you have, is because there are some beeks that don't want to medicate, but they maybe have 50 hives. So they can afford a loss easier than I can.
Thanks for sharing your hive information with me :) And we here in Calif are suffering a harsh drought as well. Actually I don't know how to raise bees in a drought free environment. I wouldn't know what to do with 200 pounds of honey :bee:
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I have never treated for nosema. It makes me wonder how common it is in my area. We are in a hot, dry climate. As I have stated many times, I hate feeding. Who treats the feral colonies that seem to exist?
Location Location Location... bees that can have flight days through out the winter are less stressed, and in the case of Nosema Apis can take cleansing flights so they aren't contaminating their hive as much. In colder areas where the bees are kept in the hive for much longer times, nosema causes more damage.
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I have never treated for nosema. It makes me wonder how common it is in my area. We are in a hot, dry climate. As I have stated many times, I hate feeding. Who treats the feral colonies that seem to exist?
Location Location Location... bees that can have flight days through out the winter are less stressed, and in the case of Nosema Apis can take cleansing flights so they aren't contaminating their hive as much. In colder areas where the bees are kept in the hive for much longer times, nosema causes more damage.
Very true and I really don't worry at all about Nosema apis when my bees are in a warmer climate like California since they will have many opportunities for cleansing flights. Nosema ceranae is a much different beast and I worry about that species even in summer!!